1. Field
The present invention relates to a refrigerator, and, more particularly, to a refrigerator having a cold air supply device.
2. Description of the Related Art
In general, a refrigerator includes a freezing compartment and a refrigerating compartment for storing food, etc., cooled by cold air that is introduced into the compartments after being heat exchanged by an evaporator. A machine room having a compressor and a condenser therein is provided in a lower position of a rear surface of the freezing or refrigerating compartment. The refrigerating compartment included in the above described general refrigerator keeps food, etc., fresh at a temperature of approximately 3° C.˜5° C., and the freezing compartment freezes food, etc., and keeps the food frozen for a long time at a sub-zero temperature.
One example of a related refrigerator is disclosed in Korean Utility Model Laid-open Publication No. 2000-0006487. The refrigerator disclosed in the above Publication includes cold air supply devices provided in rear regions of freezing and refrigerating compartments to produce and supply cold air into the compartments. The cold air supply device for the refrigerating compartment includes a rectangular evaporator mounted at the center of a rear wall surface of the refrigerating compartment, the evaporator being covered by an insulating member and an evaporator cover. The cold air supply device further comprises suction ducts to suction and guide cold air in the refrigerating compartment to the evaporator and discharge ducts to discharge the cold air, which was heat exchanged by the evaporator, into the refrigerating compartment, the suction ducts and discharge ducts being symmetrically arranged at both sides of the evaporator, respectively. A fan and a motor are provided above the center of the evaporator, to forcibly blow the cold air, which was suctioned into the lower portion of the evaporator through the suction ducts and was heat exchanged by the evaporator, into the refrigerating compartment.
The discharge ducts have upper ends to communicate with an upper portion of the evaporator and lower ends extending symmetrically along both lateral surfaces of the evaporator. Each discharge duct has a plurality of cold air discharge holes arranged in multiple stages. The suction ducts have lower ends communicating with the lower portion of the evaporator and upper ends adjacent to the discharge ducts.
In the cold air supply device for the refrigerating compartment, if cold air is discharged into the refrigerating compartment through the cold air discharge holes arranged in multiple states, the cold air flows upward to the upper region of the refrigerating compartment by natural convection phenomenon after being heat exchanged with air in the refrigerating compartment. As the heat-exchanged air is again introduced into the evaporator through the suction holes and suction ducts, the air is changed into low-temperature cold air for the continuous circulation of the cold air. Accordingly, the cold air can be uniformly distributed throughout the refrigerating compartment through the cold air discharge holes without a separate distributor.
However, the conventional cold air supply device of the refrigerator disclosed in the above Publication cannot supply the cold air into upper corners of the rear surface of the refrigerating compartment since all the cold air discharge holes are formed only in the front surface of the cold air supply device to discharge cold air forward.
In particular, in the case of a general refrigerator having a refrigerating compartment and a freezing compartment divided up and down or so-called French type refrigerator, the conventional cold air supply device could not efficiently supply the cold air toward lateral surfaces of the refrigerating compartment due to a large-size of the refrigerating compartment.
Therefore, there is a need to provide the cold air supply device with flow paths to supply the cold air to the above mentioned regions that have difficulty receiving the cold air. However, this results in a complicated manufacturing process and expensive manufacturing costs.
Furthermore, in the cold air supply device of the refrigerator disclosed in the above Publication, since the discharge ducts are provided along both the lateral surfaces of the evaporator and the suction ducts are provided at the outside of the discharge ducts, the cold air supply device has a large size, and reduces a storage space of the refrigerating compartment.